Job 31:5–40

⁵If I have walked in vanity, and my foot hath made haste to deceit:

⁶Let him weigh me in a just balance, and let God know my simplicity.

⁷If my step hath turned out of the way, and if my heart hath followed my eyes, and if a spot hath cleaved to my hands:

⁸Then let me sow and let another reap: and let my offspring be rooted out.

⁹If my heart hath been deceived upon a woman, and if I have laid wait at my friend’s door:

¹⁰Let my wife be the harlot of another, and let other men lie with her.

¹¹For this is a heinous crime, and a most grievous iniquity.

¹²It is a fire that devoureth even to destruction, and rooteth up all things that spring.

¹³If I have despised to abide judgment with my manservant, or my maidservant, when they had any controversy against me:

¹⁴For what shall I do when God shall rise to judge? and when he shall examine, what shall I answer him?

¹⁵Did not he that made me in the womb make him also: and did not one and the same form me in the womb?

¹⁶If I have denied to the poor what they desired, and have made the eyes of the widow wait:

¹⁷If I have eaten my morsel alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof:

¹⁸(For from my infancy mercy grew up with me: and it came out with me from my mother’s womb:)

¹⁹If I have despised him that was perishing for want of clothing, and the poor man that had no covering:

²⁰If his sides have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep:

²¹If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, even when I saw myself superior in the gate:

²²Let my shoulder fall from its joint, and let my arm with its bones be broken.

²³For I have always feared God as waves swelling over me, and his weight I was unable to bear.

²⁴If I have thought gold my strength, and have said to fine gold: My confidence:

²⁵If I have rejoiced over my great riches, and because my hand had gotten much.

²⁶If I beheld the sun when it shined and the moon going in brightness:

²⁷And my heart in secret hath rejoiced, and I have kissed my hand with, my mouth:

²⁸Which is a very great iniquity, and a denial against the most high God.

²⁹If I have been glad at the downfall of him that hated me, and have rejoiced that evil had found him.

³⁰For I have not given my mouth to sin, by wishing a curse to his soul.

³¹If the men of my tabernacle have not said: Who will give us of his flesh that we may be filled?

³²The stranger did not stay without, my door was open to the traveller.

³³If as a man I have hid my sin, and have concealed my iniquity in my bosom.

³⁴If I have been afraid at a very great multitude, and the contempt of kinsmen hath terrified me: and have not rather held my peace, and not gone out of the door.

³⁵Who would grant me a hearing, that the Almighty may hear my desire: and that he himself that judgeth would write a book,

³⁶That I may carry it on my shoulder, and put it about me as a crown?

³⁷At every step of mine I would pronounce it, and offer it as to a prince.

³⁸If my land cry against me, and with it the furrows thereof mourn:

³⁹If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, and have afflicted the son of the tillers thereof:

⁴⁰Let thistles grow up to me instead of wheat, and thorns instead of barley.